An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Pfad
Pfad, masculine, from the equivalent Middle High German pfat (genitive pfades), Old High German pfad, masculine, ‘path, track’; Old Saxon *path is wanting; Dutch pad, Anglo-Saxon pœþ, masculine, English path. The word is unknown to East Teutonic, and thus the difficulty of determining its origin is greatly enhanced. The prevalent opinion, which is based on the supposition, probably correct in the main, that the words beginning with High German pf and Low German p are borrowed, is satisfied with the phonetic similarity to Greek πάτος, ‘path, road,’ to prove the fact that Pfad is borrowed from the latter. With regard to this point we have to take into account the þ of the English word, which is assumed by High German, and which proves the existence of Pfad in German before the beginning of our era. But Teutonic has no such early loanwords of Greek origin (see Hanf). As we have no data, we cannot decide whether the word was introduced through a foreign medium; it is possible the word was borrowed indirectly from Greek, but the assumption that it was adopted directly from Scythian is equally valid; compare Zend paþ (also paþan, panþan), ‘way.’ In the latter case it must have passed into German after the primitive Teutonic permutation; Hanf was borrowed before this period. Its primitive kinship with Greek πάτος, ‘way’ (Sanscrit panthan, path, Zend paþan), must be decidedly rejected because Teutonic f would correspond to p in the non-Teutonic languages. Compare Humpen.